Bird aimed to make Whitehaven as famous as Dunblane

Bird, 52, gave the chilling warning in the foyer of a swimming pool in Hensingham, near Whitehaven, where he had been diving while training with Solway Sub Aqua Club. Dunblane was the scene of another notorious massacre in 1996 when 16 children and one adult were killed by Thomas Hamilton, before he committed suicide

Peter McLean, also a member of the club, told the hearing the pair had been talking about a boat trip that taxi-driver Bird was planning when – out of the blue – he suddenly made the Dunblane remark.

“He turned his back on me and said Whitehaven will be as famous as Dunblane,” Mr McLean said.

Coroner David Roberts asked Mr McLean: “At the time, what did you make of that remark?”

Mr McLean replied: “At first I thought it was a sinister thing to say, but it is such a weird thing to say, I couldn’t understand why he said it.

“I thought ‘Has he been watching too many movies?’.

Mr McLean was giving evidence on the second day of the inquest into the deaths of all 12 victims and Bird following the massacre on June 2 last year.

Earlier the inquest, at Energus in Workington, Cumbria, heard that Bird had become “paranoid” and had suicidal thoughts after becoming increasingly worried that he would be jailed for evading paying tax. He was also convinced that his twin brother David and solicitor Kevin Commons, the first of the 12 victims, were “stitching him up”.

After murdering his brother and Mr Commons, Carol Jacques, the wife of Neil Jacques, Bird’s best friend, said Bird called at their home, but her husband was out.

He had come for a gun, a Winchester 12-bore shotgun, which Bird had given Mr Jacques just the night before. Mrs Jacques said: “He just knocked on the door, opened the door and he asked for a gun and I just said ‘What are you on about?’.

“He said ‘Neil has got my gun, I want the gun’ and I said ‘Neil has it in the cabinet and I have not got the key’.

“I asked him if he wanted a cuppa and he said ‘No, I’m going’ and he left. It lasted only a matter of seconds.”

Mrs Jacques added later that Bird “looked really tired. He was in a hurry, he just wanted to get away”.

The inquest continues.